How I lost my tea plantation to India’s dark underworld

A British former tea plantation owner claims his family were bullied and harassed into selling their estate by corrupt politicians who ran a southern Indian state for more than 25 years.

Peter Craig-Jones, 60, is at the centre of a scandal over the Kodanad estate in Tamil Nadu, which was the private residence of the late J Jayalalitha, chief minister of Tamil Nadu between 1991 and her death last year. She acquired the property from the Jones family in 1994, and had subsequently claimed that the scenic garden estate was an ancestral heirloom.

Mr Craig-Jones alleged this week that Jayalalitha, and her close aide, V K Sasikala, used a cast of characters – including a liquor baron, a wanted businessman and 150 goondas (thugs) – to coerce his father into selling the 906 acres of land, valued at Rs 11 crore (equivalent to around £1. 3 million in today’s money) for as low as Rs 7 crore (£845,000)....